Standing Still, Time Lies

Chapter 5: New Friends

Suddenly, I hear a loud thud coming from the other side of the store. My head spins at the sound, my heart pounding in my chest as my eyes dart around the store hastily. I grab a nearby fire extinguisher, deciding it would make a decent weapon if anything attacked me.

I look over to where the noise came from, my eyes going wide as I see a massive silverfish-like creature crawling its way through the front of the store, its numerous long, spindly legs causing a clicking sound to echo across the store as it slowly crossed the space into the aisle next to mine. I watch through the slats in the shelves, cowering in fear.

Unexpectedly, I hear "Oh shit!" from the other aisle, and realise there's someone else here. 'I'm not alone!' I mentally cheer as I brace myself to do the stupidest thing... not running away.

I climb the shelves, my tree climbing skills finally coming in handy for once, and I view the situation from above. Standing on the top shelf, my head brushes the ceiling, even when I'm crouched. 'Not a lot of room up here', I think to myself.

I see the giant monster, its thick, scaly body shining silver, and its' mandibles clacking together in a rhythmic clicking sound, aimed at a girl of about my age. Her curly brown hair swung out to the side, barely missing the creature, as she jumped at a shelf, swinging herself into the gap sideways as its head rammed into the space she was moments before. Its shiny, silver back looked a bit like the scales of a fish, and it had multiple eyes on the sides of its face, darting around angrily.

She quickly slipped out of the shelf, and down onto the ground, lunging for a children's toy sword to attack the monster with.

She grabbed it and thrust it at the monster, straight into one of its eyes. It let out a nasty screech before wiggling its entire body round against all the shelves, filling the aisle, trying to squish her.

Whilst it was distracted, I decided to try and help.

"Hey, over here!" I shouted across to the girl.

She looked up, surprised, before scrambling up the shelves on the other side of the aisle.

"Thanks!" She shouted back, smirking slightly.

I tossed across the fire extinguisher I'd picked up earlier.

"Spray it when i say so, ok?" I shout.

She nods, showing she understood, and then I walk across the shelves to the closest sprinkler. Pulling out the lighter I still had stored in my backpack from the barn, I hold it up to the sprinkler head, and wait for it to be detected.

"Now!" I yell, as the sprinkler system comes on and a loud siren wail starts. I cover my ears to the sound as its so close to me, but the monster just writhes around.

The girl jumps down to the ground with the extinguisher, and lets the foam fly in the creature's face.

"Whoop whoop!" She cheers, dancing around a little bit at our small victory.

I laugh. This is the craziest shit I've ever been part of, and it's hilarious to me.

I get down from atop the shelves, and stand behind her.

She stops, and turns to look at me, smiling.

"Hey, I'm Sara." She holds out a foamy hand, and laughs.

"Hey..." I laugh too, unable to finish my sentence.

Without warning, the monster twitches, and our eyes widen as we look at each other, slightly scared but half daring. She goes up to the creature, now lying on the floor defeated, and gently boops its nose with her boot. It breathes out heavily and she scurries backwards before laughing again.